Carl Sanders

Carl Sanders (15 May 1925-16 November 2014) was Governor of Georgia (D) from 15 January 1963 to 11 January 1967, succeeding Ernest Vandiver and preceding Lester Maddox.

Biography
Carl Sanders was born in Augusta, Richmond County, Georgia on 15 May 1925, and he joined the US Air Force during World War II while playing football at the University of Georgia at Athens. From 1945 to 1945, he served on B-17 Flying Fortresses, and he earned his law degree after returning home. In 1954, he was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives as a Democratic Party member, and he was elected to the State Senate two years later. In 1962, he won the governorship, the first Georgia governor from an urban area since the 1920s. He worked to improve education and the environment and cooperated with John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson with enforcing civil rights laws during the Civil Rights movement. In 1966, he endorsed Lester Maddox as his successor due to his own term limits, and he attempted to run against Jimmy Carter in the 1970 gubernatorial election; Carter appealed to white racism to defeat Sanders, distributing pictures of Sanders congratulating a black baseball team to voters. He became a part-owner of the Atlanta Hawks, and he was chairman of the Troutman Sanders LLP law firm for 30 years. He died in 2014 at the age of 89.